Well, hello and welcome to Crowd Church's non-live livestream August series. My
name is Matt Edmundson, and I just wanted to jump on before we get started with
today's talk and tell you what's going on. So this isn't our usual Sunday
service. I know, but it is our usual August Crowd service. If you're a regular
to Crowd, you will have twigged already that we are not live. We're not in our
studio as we would usually be when we livestream. Which means I won't be
fighting the usual technical difficulties, but I may well fluff the odd line.
Just putting that out there. And here's why it's a little bit different. Because
in August, half of Crowd Church kind of disappear to somewhere hot, and the
other half of us are trying to kind of figure out, well, why did we not book
somewhere, right? It is the month in the UK that most of the team get to book
their holidays because of family. So we lean in, we lean— see, messing my lines
up— we lean into that every August. And we pre-record the talks. So we don't
have the Conversation Street. We don't have Live Lounge. And the whole team just
gets to stop for the entire month of August. We think of it as our Sabbath rest.
And it's a practice we've done every year. Yeah, so that people who serve you
week in week, they get some proper Sabbath rest and you still get something
worth turning up for. The talks are actually Brilliant. Uh, you'll get a lot out
of them. So make sure you keep watching on a Sunday with your cup of tea, or
possibly in August on a Wednesday afternoon when you're avoiding something
important. I don't know, whatever suits you. And of course, if you're new here
to Crowd, let me give you a big fat hello. Crowd is an online church, uh,
actually with, uh, members all over the place. Everything we do here at Crowd,
from the Sunday livestream to our midweek community groups, even the online
course for those exploring Christianity All of it is on the website, which is
www.crowd.church. Now this August, we are in the book of Psalms for 5 weeks, 5
Psalms. These are sort of Psalms written by people that— it's the book in the
middle of the New Old Testament. And there's going to be a thread running
through this series, which is what restoration actually looks like when your
life is all over the place, which Hands up if you need to hear that right now.
One more thing before we get started, make sure you stay with us to the end of
the video because there are some changes coming to Crowd starting in September,
all of them good ones. And I'm going to tell you about a few of them after the
talk. So hopefully that's created enough intrigue. But that's it. Let's settle
in. Grab your notebooks, grab your pens. Let's enjoy the talk. I'll be back.
After this.
I don't know where you are in the world or what the situation is like in your
country, but I do know that you're in a battle right now. Maybe you're painfully
aware of it. Maybe you haven't got the faintest idea what I'm talking about. The
battle I'm talking about is a spiritual battle, as we can see in the book of
Ephesians. Ephesians 6:12 says, for our struggle is not against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark
world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. The
battle also takes place in our minds. 2 Corinthians 10 says this: For though we
live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight
with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power
to demolish strongholds, We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets
itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to
make it obedient to Christ. The 2025 Mental Health Report produced by Mind and
the Centre for Mental Health found that 1 in 5 adults in England are living with
a common mental health problem. Amongst 16 to 24-year-olds, mental ill health
rose from 17.5% in 2007 to 25.8% in 2023 to 2024. The good news about Jesus is
good news for every area of our life, including our mental health. Jo Hargreaves
is a Christian psychotherapist who integrates theology and therapy. She says
that the Bible is the most regulating book for our nervous system. And by
implication for our minds. In it, we come face to face with a God who tells us
we are lovingly created for a purpose. We're not just a cosmic accident. We are
unconditionally loved, fully understood, and that he wants a, a loving
relationship with us. He's patient and kind. He's dependable. He's present. But
we have an adversary who wants to steal, kill and destroy. He wants us to walk
away from our relationship with the source of life and health, and he does that
mostly by whispering lies to us. What we believe about God, ourselves, and other
people affects the way we act. And one of the times we are most vulnerable to
those lies is during times of hardship. Times of hardship are a bit like a
crossroads Which path are we going to take? Are we going to walk away from God
or walk towards him? Can you think of a time when you felt utterly desperate?
Maybe you had a health crisis that rocked your world, or maybe you had chronic
pain where your suffering felt relentless. Maybe it was a painful or broken
relationship. Maybe you watched someone you love suffer illness or repeated
rejection. Maybe you've suffered abuse. Maybe you've sent hundreds of job
applications and haven't had a single lead or even a reply, and you feel
worthless. Maybe you felt that no one understands you. Maybe you felt deeply
lonely. Maybe that's how you feel now. If so, the psalm we're about to look at
today may seem as though it were written for you only this morning. In the
Bible, the Psalms are sacred songs used for praise and worship, but they're not
just full of lovely words about God. They touch on some of our deepest emotions
and difficult circumstances. Today we're going to look at Psalm 77 by a man
called Asaph. Now, many scholars believe that it was the Asaph who lived in King
David's era. Others think it was a different Asaph, written during a later
national crisis involving threat of invasion by the Assyrians, or around the
time of Babylonian exile. We're going to look at how Asaph's suffering led to a
battle in his mind and how he dealt with that. It's not a comprehensive answer
to the question of our mental health or the battle for our minds, but it's part
of the puzzle. Here's the first part of the psalm. I cried out to God for help.
I cried out to God to hear me. When I was in distress, I sought the Lord. At
night I stretched out untiring hands, and I would not be comforted. I remembered
You, God, and I groaned. I meditated, and my spirit grew faint. You kept my eyes
from closing. I was too troubled to speak. Notice how he started off crying out
to God in his distress. Even some atheists have been known to cry out to God
when their world seems to be crumbling. Maybe you're one of them. So he started
with words, but after a while, words weren't enough to express the depth of his
pain, and all he had left was groans. Have you ever been given words by other
people that were intended to comfort you, but they had the opposite effect
because they made light of your situation? Words such as, "Just trust God and it
will all be okay," "Just think of all the people worse off than you," "It could
be worse," "Look on the bright side." Lamentations 2:19 says, "Arise, cry out in
the night as the watches of the night begin. Pour out your heart like water in
the presence of the Lord." In the UK, especially in the era of my grandparents,
the standard approach to difficult situations was the stiff upper lip, stiff
upper lip approach. That approach meant staying outwardly strong and denying or
hiding your feelings. The Bible doesn't seem to advocate the hiding of your
feelings. Rather, it encourages us to pour out our hearts like water in the
presence of the Lord. Faith doesn't mean pretending that everything is okay when
it's not. Rather, faith is about a relationship with the living God. It's about
being honest about how we feel, but then looking to God for the truth. Not to
distract ourselves from facing reality by constantly scrolling or binge-watching
TV series or using constant work as an avoidance technique. God is big enough to
deal with it all. The next verses say this: I thought about the former days, the
years of long ago. I remembered my songs in the night. My heart meditated and my
spirit asked, will the Lord reject forever? Will He never show His favor again?
Has His unfailing love vanished forever? Has His promise failed for all time?
Has God forgotten to be merciful? Has He in anger withheld His compassion? Our
difficult circumstances can lead us to look back on times when we were happy and
ask questions about God in the present. To question His character and intent
towards us, Has he rejected me? Does he really love me? Is he angry with me?
Does God actually exist? Because if he does and he's all good and all-powerful,
surely he wouldn't allow this to happen. So what does the writer do with all
those emotions, questions, and doubts? Let's continue reading. Then I thought,
to this I will appeal: the years when the Most High stretched out his right
hand. I will remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember your miracles
of long ago. I will consider all your works and meditate on all your mighty
deeds. He starts to remember the times when God came through for his people. He
starts to remember who God is and remind himself of the truth. Whether you are a
Christ follower or not, think back over your life to when you cried out to God
and he answered you, or to times when been really aware of his presence. I
recently had the privilege of listening to some people's stories of this on an
online Alpha course that we do as part of Crowd Church. For those of you don't
know, Alpha is a course designed for people who are investigating the Christian
faith. It's a space to find out what the faith is about and to be able to ask
all your questions in a safe space. A few weeks ago, we were looking at the
first session about the Holy Spirit. I asked the question, have you ever had a
time when you experienced unexplained peace or guidance? The answers really
encouraged me. Everyone had a story, big or small, of spiritual experiences in
some dire situations. If you would like to join an Alpha course, you can either
sign up for one in the many churches around the world who run them, or you could
sign up for an Alpha online with Crowd Church. But what if you can't think of
any experiences of God in your life? If you're serious about wanting to know if
God exists, and if he does, does he care about you? Ask him to reveal himself to
you. Jeremiah 29 says this: You will seek me and find me when you seek me with
all your heart. This is not a one-off seeking, but a continual seeking. And he
may not answer in the way you want or expect, or in a time frame you'd like. But
he will answer. The writer goes on to say, your ways, God, are holy. What, uh,
God is as great as our God? You are the God who performs miracles. You display
your power among the peoples. With your mighty arm, you redeemed your people,
the descendants of Jacob and Joseph. The waters saw you, God. The waters saw and
writhed. The very depths depths were convulsed. The clouds poured down water,
the heavens resounded with thunder. Your arrows flashed back and forth, your
thunder was heard in the whirlwind, your lightning lit up the world, the earth
trembled and quaked. Your path led through the sea, your way through the mighty
waters, through the footprints— though the footprints were not seen. You led
your people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron. Asaph, the writer of
the psalm, begins to recall times from long ago when God came through for his
people. He's referring to when God rescued his people from slavery in Egypt and
parted the sea so that they could walk through and escape the Egyptians. They
too had cried out to God and wondered if he was listening and if he cared. But
God had heard and he did come and rescue them. Although not in the timescale
they would have liked. When we remember the good things that God has done in our
past, it gives us comfort in the present and hope for the future. It's no wonder
that God often asked his people to build memorials after significant events and
to tell their children and their grandchildren all that God had done for their
ancestors. The writer of the psalm wasn't even alive at the time of the miracles
he's bringing to mind, so he didn't even experience them himself. We too can use
other people's stories about what God has done as an encouragement to ourselves.
We're not all necessarily going to get the miracle that we want in the way and
the time that we want one, as by definition they're not the standard way things
work. But the miracles that do happen are not only for the encouragement of the
person who received them, but they're for all of us. They're a reminder that God
is a— is powerful and does care, that one day God will put all things right. And
God also works in other ways, not just through miracles, but in many other ways.
The last verse of this Psalm says, "You led your people like a flock by the hand
of Moses and Aaron." In the Old Testament, God is referred to as a shepherd. In
the New Testament, Jesus explicitly claims this identity. In John 10:10, Jesus
says, 'I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd lays his life down for the
sheep.' The author of the psalm didn't mention any resolution to the question of
why he was suffering other than looking back and remembering God's character.
What we do know is that it wasn't because God didn't care. All through the Old
Testament, we see a God who passionately cares for his people. In Jesus, we see
a God who joins us in our suffering. He came to make us free from the inside out
and will one day set all things right. So if you're going through a tough time
right now and questioning God's existence, his love and care for you, take heart
from this psalm. Run to God rather than away from him and pour out your heart to
him. But don't stop there. Choose to turn your thoughts to stories of what he's
done, either for you or for other people. Remind yourself of who God is and what
he's done. If you don't have any of your own stories yet, there are loads on The
Crowd's What's the Story podcast, which you can find on our website. And turn
your thoughts to Jesus. Jesus showed us God's unconditional love. I'll finish
with a passage from the book of Romans. It says this, it's Romans 8:31-32. If
God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but
delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all
good things?
So that's the talk, and you're going to be able to find all of the notes, a sort
of a detailed blog post about it, all on the website, which is www.crowd.church.
And of course, if you'd rather listen than watch, you know, maybe you're on the
school run, on a dog walk, washing up, whatever it is, every talk goes out as a
podcast. Just search Crowd— uh, not Crowd Church, that's our website— search
Crowd Church wherever you get your podcasts from. I reference back my previous
point about fluffing lines. Now, I did say at the start that there were some
changes coming to Crowd, so do let me tell you about them. Number 1, Live
Lounge. Now, normally Live Lounge is a chance to jump and chat to the team, to
jump, jump on to a call and chat with members of the team after the live stream
has ended. But from September, you're gonna be able to do that from the start of
the live stream, you'll be able to watch the live stream in Live Lounge and
watch it with actual people, for your community, your friends, maybe even make
some new friends. And like I say, going to do that right from the start, which
I'm really excited about, because it is going to help us build community. We
have a phenomenal community here at Crowd Church. And building on that, I think
is going to just be exciting and phenomenal. So that's going to be one change.
The second change, the Wednesday night community groups are changing a little
bit. So instead of having scattered and disparate groups, we're going to gather
together as one big community and then break into smaller groups. And And each
small group will be your regular sort of community group where people get to
know your name. When they notice if you're not there, and you get to build your
friendships. Alpha will run alongside Community from September. It's going to
move to a Wednesday night, same time, 7:30. Um, and Alpha is great if you're new
to the Christian faith or if you're just exploring the Christian faith. The next
Alpha course starts on the 9th of September. September, and you can register for
that on the website at www.crowd.church. We have lots of people coming to Alpha.
They are phenomenal things. Um, so yeah, go check out the website, uh, for more
information about that at Crowd Church. The third change, uh, is more in-person
meetups.
Yay!
Go in-person meetups! Now, we baptized, uh, some folks in Dorset, uh, last
month, which was really phenomenal. We thought, actually, we need to do more of
in-person meetup. So that's what we're going to do. We are planning gatherings
throughout the year, from regional meetups to bigger events. Again, more
information will be coming, more information on the website. One thing to tell
you about, CrowdFest 27 will be held— with CrowdFest is going to be a big
get-together where we all get together. And we're going to do that at the
Wildfires Festival at the end of July in 2027. You can find out more information
about Wildfires Festival and buy your tickets at wildfiresfestival.com, um, or
just follow the links from the website because there's going to be more
information on the website about CrowdFest 27, crowd.church. So yeah, if that's
not it, there's more stuff coming. Yes, there are. So, but I don't want to
bombard you. We're going to go through that in more detail in September. Yes, we
are. So in the meantime, like I said, everything you want to know about Crowd
from past talks all the stuff we've talked about today is on the website,
www.crowd.church. Make sure you subscribe to the channel, uh, whilst you're
here, because like I said, this is a 5-parter all the way through the Book of
Psalms, and it's built to be taken as a whole. Each one's going to build onto
the next one, so don't miss any of them. But that's it from me. Thank you so
much for joining us. Have a phenomenal week wherever you are in the world. I
will see you next time. Bye for now.